


Spider Silk

by Notabluemaia



Series: The Quest and Beyond [5]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Bag End, Canon Illustration, Hope, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Quest, Spiders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-07
Updated: 2013-08-07
Packaged: 2017-12-22 18:27:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Notabluemaia/pseuds/Notabluemaia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nightmare remains far too close, threatening all that Frodo has.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spider Silk

Illustration: _Spider Silk_ , Pastel, G  
  


[ ](http://www.flickr.com/photos/notabluemaia/216821763/)

  
  
  
  


**Spider Silk**

  
  
There. It was done. The thing was done, and perhaps, even done well. At least as well as he could do, if there were enough left within him to manage anything well—  
  
No. Such misgivings were not worthy of the faith Sam had in him, for that, if nothing else, proved that he was capable still, despite his chastened understanding of what 'self-doubt' truly meant. But this, this he _could_ still do.  
  
Frodo sighed and reached for his blotter, noting just in time that one rolled cuff had unfurled and threatened to drag through the wet ink. Disaster averted, he leaned closer to re-read the last of the lines he had drafted, his eyesight blurred by fatigue as he felt absently for the button to secure his sleeve–  
  
No, he remembered now that he had chosen this favourite old nightshirt from the very back of his wardrobe. A reminder of blithe youth, it had been tucked behind neatly folded linens from conscientious years as Master, and the perfectly-tailored silks from Minas Tirith, finer than he deserved, that chafed his sensibilities if not his skin, and seemed as scratchy as an old sack. But this was comforting, if a bit frayed, with both cuffs now buttonless; either Rose or Sam – he could himself if he had tried – would have stitched on the finest buttons in the Shire, if they had noticed.  
  
He folded whisper-soft fabric up to his elbows as he scanned the text for errors of sound or meaning, reading softly aloud, his head tilted the better to listen, to hear the pure music of words, however lacking and uncertain his own arrangement might be. There was so much for which he had neither words nor understanding; terror and tenderness reverberated between the lines, and there was much that lay beyond his ken.  
  
 _Evil I could never have imagined, that now I know… But also, love beyond measure, given so freely both then and now._  
  
Had he written truth enough to tell the tale so that those who came after might know, if not all, then at least as much as they would need? Yes, at last, it said what it must, and all that remained for his task was to transcribe sentences interwoven with scrawled corrections onto the thick vellum pages of the red book, writing his best hand as carefully as Bilbo had taught him long ago.  
  
 _'There, my boy, good. Nicely done… now be sure not to smudge it, after all…'_  
  
But not tonight, for his hand shook as he lifted and pressed the blotter onto the page.  
  
 _'More pages come to ruin when you're almost finished, and no longer paying heed, for it takes only that one blot for your best efforts to be spoiled…_  
  
He flexed his fingers and glanced to the untouched cup of honeyed tea Rose had brought – it must be hours ago – and lifted it, shaking, to his lips; he gulped it down to the leaves that settled at the bottom. Cold now and a bitter brew, but even that was welcome. The cup rattled against its saucer as he set it down; he ran his fingers through curls clinging lank upon his brow.  
  
The night _was_ muggy, unusually so for Halimath, and this close to his birthday. The fire in the grate, constant companion for its cheer as well as comfort to his shoulder and aching hand, was burned out for the first time in weeks. He had been distracted of course, completing what must be said of matters he scarcely could recall, and of others he remembered all too well. He shivered, despite the heat, and laid his damaged hand over the bone-aching chill stretching icy fingers outward from the scar.  
  
Now there was not so much as a glow left in the embers and he realised that no one— that _Sam_ had not come in…  
  
 _He has another life to tend, now, and so much else to do…_  
  
He shook aside imaginings far too invasive of the life flourishing once more at Bag End— _as well it should, and for which I am so grateful… the most fortunate hobbit in the Shire…_  
  
He sighed, rolling his shoulders, and knowing at last how very tired he was. The room was dark, save for his candle, burning low, not a glimmer left of the fire that had proved too warm. It must be late; he should go to bed, try to find rest and refuge in slumber. But he walked already this dream of a waking life, sweat-tangled eiderdown binding his weary limbs – and without Sam by his side, he would find no comfort there. Far better now to seek whatever gentle breeze cooled Sam's garden to clear the cobwebs from his mind and dry this wetness upon his skin to salt. But to get there he must creep, anxious neither to hear nor to be heard, past the closed door beyond which the life of Bag End burgeoned, spilling vibrant into the darkened hallway, casting a net of bright sounds – _a gasp, a cry, a crooning lullaby_ – that snared his every step.  
  
He closed his eyes, pressed his fingers to his temples, massaging as Sam so often had done, even _then_ putting Frodo before all, regardless of his own fatigue and fears.  
  
 _'There you go, me dear, just rest and know that I am right here… there won't be a thing as can get by your Sam… rest, my love…'_  
  
Sam's hands…  
  
 _loving me, saving me, and Middle-earth in despite of me, when he carried me to fulfill what was my doom alone_  
  
Sam, whose life-giving hands held now the restoration of their Shire. Parched earth and stinging nettles had greeted their return, and before them village and Row alike had been laid waste.  
  
 _'It can be healed, Frodo-love. Time and care will set all to rights in the end.'_  
  
 _'Time, and much work, Sam. But Bag End will again be filled with life, my love.'_  
  
 _'Aye, with orchards and flowers and everything a home needs, everything love and a good garden can give—'_  
  
 _'And with children, Sam. And though I cannot give them to you, I know that they will come, and already I love each one of them as our own.'_  
  
Sam must live for him the dream of every hobbit in the Shire, the dream for which he had given his life, consumed as a candle that flared too bright, and burned too fast, failing to cold grey ash and a gutted hollow shell…  
  
 _Sam has so much yet to do and to be… and I am so tired, so very tired…_  
  
Frodo laid one hand upon the rapid rise and fall of his chest, waiting for his breathing to ease with the pain. Impatiently he swiped his brow with the back of his hand and opened his eyes: his papers lay before him, and his study all around, filled with shadow and shrouded memories.  
  
 _Too close… too warm…_  
  
He shook his head to pull himself from memory, to _remember_ what he was about. Ah, yes – the fire, he had let it go out, had been thinking of bed, of rest. If only he _could_ find rest… perhaps a cooling breeze would clear the cobwebs from his mind.  
  
In the garden, wind soughed through the newly planted saplings promising peace and shade in the years to come.  
  
 _Sam's garden…_  
  
He stood unsteadily, bracing himself with one hand upon the edge of his desk, and in two steps staggered to the windowsill. Shaking hands slipped up over the frame's glossy paint to unlock and fling open the window, to welcome whatever peace he could find, to cast into the night the _too much_ that he could no longer bear. Glinting brass latched the panes– he turned the lock smoothly, smelling the mineral tang of oil, and pushed the window outwards—  
  
Gossamer dragged across his hand and wrist  
  
 _…the whispered touch of death's winding cloth, the first thread binding failing flailing limbs as pain and poison paralyze –_  
  
–and there before his face, in a shimmer of torn silk, dangled a spider, legs splayed wide, wide as his palm and seeking…  
  
 _No!_  
  
He jerked back, clawing away sticky filaments, knocking over his chair with a crash, stumbling as the corner of his desk bit sharply into his hip, fumbling at papers, blotter, quills – here, the trimming knife, its short blade slicing his fingertip as he grabbed and dropped it–  
  
 _…blood on my words, my hands…_  
  
But better, this— yes, _this_ would serve! He seized the sharp letter opener—  
  
And lunged to rip and shred the remnants of nightmare, weapon held high as his shadow fell across the web –  
  
 _Gone! Where has it gone?_  
  
Was it— could it be here in the room with him now? Crawling, creeping, stinging…  
  
 _Silence, a scrabble, the click of claws on rock…_  
  
 _Find it, kill it!_  
  
He glanced to the casement; surely that bloated body would reveal itself against the shining green– but no, nothing there, and he shifted so the candlelight might flow past him through the window, edged his shoulder to the frame to peer beyond, lifted upon tiptoes to search, to stab at the air—  
  
And there—  
  
 _Kill!_  
  
He saw her – a tight knot huddled small against one silvered strand, retreated high beyond his reach and from the destruction he had wrought: much of the delicate web hung in tatters below, its graceful symmetry shredded by his hand.  
  
And in the window glass he saw horror far worse – his own face, twisted to a cruel rage.  
  
Shaking, he collapsed hard against the wall, his heart pounding, and his weapon dropped to the floorboards with a sharp clatter. His chin drooped to his chest and he closed his eyes tightly, gasping to catch his breath and slow a heartbeat that threatened to race beyond him.  
  
 _Am I diminished now to the point that I would attack – would kill – an innocent creature?_  
  
Behind him the candle on his desk sputtered; he needed air, a soft breeze. He opened his eyes, gripped the sill as he edged back and forced himself to look through the window.  
  
She was there again, mere inches from his face, with far too many legs deft in motion, each one striped brown and black, and bristled; her body plump and intricately patterned. She was already reweaving the section he had torn, touching spinnerets to each spoke, dropping suspended by silk from one to the next to repair what was left of her beautiful creation.  
  
 _I do not like spiders, much, and surely have reason for my fear… but not for such cruelty._  
  
Am I no better than…?  
  
He drew a deep breath of cool air, and fixed his gaze upon his fear, trying to separate memory and dread from the truth before him as he watched her skilful restoration. She looped the last strands and scuttled along the spokes to crouch low on the zigzag stitchery at the hub, waiting as his light drew small flying insects to her web.  
  
 _Heedless as they, I ran toward my doom – abandoning my love to face his alone._  
  
One pale green moon moth fluttered too close already— Frodo gasped, knowing what must come, and clasped one hand protectively to the remembered ache in his neck, but he forced himself only to watch as nature unfolded this purely natural act. This was not _his_ tale – this was the story of the garden, and of life. The moth thrashed fierce and futile as the spider sprang upon it, her sting a bite from cruel fangs. She roped it quickly to her web, winding a death shroud over struggles that grew faint and faded fast.  
  
 _Did I fight so? Did I witness Sam's battle, but forget his bravery in my terror after? Who pulled the winding silk from my face, my body – did Sam, or… did they?_  
  
The hapless moth was rolled within her web, tightly bound, the bundle severed and released to hang freely from one strong line. And then, to his amazement, inch by slow inch she hoisted, lifted, and finally secured her prey high in her web, where she might safely suck the fluids from its body, to leave a dry and empty husk.  
  
 _Just as Sam found me, though he did not know it then._  
  
But Sam had not believed him dead; for grief alone he would not have battled so fiercely in the Pass. His love had paid no heed to how still his master lay, only to the monster that had hurt him and must pay. In love, Sam had believed that he lived, had fought to save him then, in desperate hope for his life. For their lives. Hoping that they might live, hoping for life… together.  
  
 _Can I do less than hope?_  
  
He slipped one hand beneath his nightshirt to enfold the jewel upon his breast, and turned his face to the moon in the west. A gentle wind lifted his hair, dried the tears upon his cheeks. Candlelight flickered unhindered past him and through the remnants of the orb, its netted spokes glistening, its strong anchor threads disappearing into the clematis around the window. Moonlight pooled upon the lawn and the border of dahlias and chrysanthemums, shadowed here though their jewel colours glowed beneath the sun–  
  
 _'They'll be colour for now and give what takes longer to bloom some time…'_  
  
…and fell upon the single rose bush left unshattered after Sharkey's devastation, the last of those grown for him so long ago, its creamy blossoms a promise of love enduring and the resilience of their Shire. White roses, they were and would be again by Sam's hand, creamy soft as a lover's most tender flesh, their pricking thorns a fierce defense, cultivated so long ago for _him_ , though never again might he see them bloom…  
  
He braced himself with both hands pressed to the sill, polished to a gleam by generations of Bagginses before, of young Gamgees to come, smoothed by small hands stained dark with both ink and rich garden soil. Here he had leaned just so in his youth, and beside him someday would stand a golden lass, a namesake lad, and another, another, and yet more. They would peer from this study and its musty legends to a garden restored, flourishing. Every one of them as eager as he to escape and find their own adventure, despite enthusiasm for old tales such as he had written– _and lived, beyond my childish dreams, and all it seems I know, now…_ To run and play, to dig and sing and grow. To grow up… and sometime to know sweet kisses – _again, please again_ – and lie entwined on fragrant thyme beneath an arching trellis, beside bushes heavy with rose bud and blossom and blood red hip, season upon season, year after year.  
  
 _No hobbit has ever been better loved than I, until and past the death we both believed was ours; no hobbit loved more than my Sam._  
  
I will hope to live, though I leave all that I love  
  
Sam – first, most and forever.  
  
"Frodo?" A gentle tap and his study door opened.  
  
"I am here, Sam."  
  
"I was longer than I thought to be." Sam was warm within his embrace, his body pressing hard and healthy and strong. Frodo pulled him closer and deepened their kiss; he smelled of fresh-bathed babe and milky kisses. "I rocked her sound asleep, but I fell asleep, too."  
  
"You needed the rest, dearest. So much still for you to do – I knew you would come when you could." Frodo leaned back within the circle of Sam's arms, smiling, and smoothed back sweat-damp, sleep-tangled hair from his brow.  
  
"It's a warm one, isn't it?" Sam glanced to the hearth. "I didn't think you'd want a fire tonight."  
  
"No, by the time I thought of it, all I wanted was a cool breeze."  
  
"There's a fine one tonight! Here, I'll open the window more—"  
  
"Sam!" Frodo laid a hand of gentle restraint on Sam's arm and gestured.  
  
"Oh!" Sam flinched at the sight of the web; frowning, he leaned cautiously to peer at the spider and her prey at its upper edge then turned back to Frodo, his expression concerned. "Frodo?"  
  
"I am fine, now." Frodo smiled reassurance. "But she gave me quite a start."  
  
"No wonder!'" Sam shook his head. "She's a big one, isn't she? And her web—"  
  
"I tore it, Sam, in an unforgivable temper—"  
  
"Oh, Frodo-love!" Sam pulled Frodo close. "She'd give anyone a fright."  
  
"Perhaps if my hand hadn't brushed it… but Sam, that is no excuse."  
  
"Frodo, I know you – you'd never really hurt her, or anything for that matter. There's no real harm; she has to mend it every time she catches her dinner, and orb-weavers often make their webs afresh every nightfall then take them down – why, they even eat them! - with morning's light, and that's not far now."  
  
"I had no idea! She actually is quite interesting. And her web _was_ very beautiful. But even the thought of touching—"  
  
"I should think so! It's hard enough to look on her, despite knowing how much good her kind does in the garden. You know, I could move her easily enough. Lots of other nice spider-y places out there."  
  
"No, Sam. I have made my peace with her, and not every reminder is itself an evil. I think it best that she remain, though with autumn upon us she will be gone soon enough."  
  
"Leaving a tidy bundle of spiderlings for next summer!"  
  
"Just what I want – more! I have trouble enough with one!" Laughing, Frodo pulled Sam close to whisper in his ear. "Look on next spring's hatchlings, and for every one, remember _this_."  
  
Sam's lips were sweet, and his hands were strong as he caressed Frodo's flanks through the thin gown. Their breathing quickened, and Frodo gasped, "Sam, let us go to bed, for this is more than I want to share with that spider!"  
  
"Nor do I, love!" Sam laughed and hugged Frodo tightly; he stepped back to stretch, unsuccessfully covering a yawn.  
  
"Samwise, you're not too tired...?" Frodo teased, as he laid one hand gently upon Sam's shoulder.  
  
"You just wait, Frodo Baggins, and you'll see!"  
  
"I count on that – always. But now, to bed, my love… we shall find rest together."  
  
On his desk, the candle sputtered, but it had not yet gone out. Frodo smiled at Sam as he reached for the candleholder, shielding the flame's flicker with one hand; light shone through the narrow gap between his fingers, and fell upon the web, shimmering in the cool breeze before the dawn.  
  


~***~

 

 

[ ](http://www.flickr.com/photos/notabluemaia/2273466344/)

_Spider Silk  
Pastel, pencil_

[Illustration: ](http://notabluemaia.livejournal.com/145863.html)_Spider Silk, versions_ , G  



End file.
